Simone Dress & Top

I’ve always loved Victory’s designs. They are absolutely unique to the brand, and they appeal to the more adventurous side of my sense of style. They are the clothes I would love to wear but rarely find myself buying.

So why not try making them? As my first attempt, I chose the Simone Top. It helped that I knew that I had bought a pair of contrasting fabrics that I intended to use in something else, but that would be perfect for this pattern. The main fabric is a combed cotton voile from Mood with a floral, sorta French porcelain design on it. The contrast is a yellow paisley voile, also from Mood, that shares the same pink tones as the blue fabric. They aren’t meant to match, but they coordinate quite nicely, if I do say so myself.

I sewed up a very quick test garment, which I almost always do for woven garments, and, to my complete surprise and joy, found that Victory Patterns fit my bodice better than any indie pattern company I’ve come across. Yipee!! I was able to sew a straight size 6 without moving the shoulder seam forward or changing the position of the darts, which I always have to do with most patterns. (Hello, rounded shoulders and low boobs).

I especially love the racerback, which makes my shoulders look waaaay smaller than they actually are. I used flat piping for the front placket, instead of covered piping, and I left off the front tab, which another blog said looked like a little tie and now I can’t unsee it. To account for that, I changed the keyhole opening a little bit to be the same shape as the pointed placket. For the whole thing, I also used peach thread because I knew that top-stiching would have to appear on both fabrics and I thought that navy thread would be too much on the yellow fabric and yellow thread would be too noticeable on the blue fabric. I like how it turned out; the top-stitching really blends on both.

I did have some problems with the instructions. Well, one problem. The picture for the front pleats does not match the actual way the pleats look when pressed towards the center. Something got reversed in the image, I think, but if you’re going to sew this pattern, use the verbal instructions for this part, not the images.

I would also add about half an each to the side seams on the back bodice. I’ve noticed after wearing this top a few times that the side seam swings towards the back, which is not great. But as pattern adjustments go, this one is minor at best.

Overall, though, I love this pattern and will look to making more Simones and more Victory Patterns in the future.